The Slough Of Despond

The Crab Nebula 

The sky a seems to have sunk into a Slough of Despond at the moment, which is of course is a deep bog in John Bunyan's, The Pilgrim's Progress, into which the character Christian sinks under the weight of his sins and his sense of guilt for them, not that you should necessarily do this, but that is of course between you and your conscience. There really is nothing much happening, and certainly not before midnight.

So in the absence of any planets in the evening star, except of course a setting Jupiter, and with the waning moon rising later all the time, it may be a good time to look for some deeper sky objects. There’s the winter star cluster M41, visible in binoculars about one binocular field south of Sirius, It contains about 100 stars including several red giants, Its age is estimated at between 190 and 240 million years old. So compared to the Sun, its stars are still in nappies.

You could also like between the horns of Taurus? Taurus is easily spotted just above Orion, the horns sweeping backward from Aldebaran, the bulls baleful red eye. You should see a hazy smudge which is the Crab Nebula.

And then there’s the Andromeda galaxy around half way between Cassiopeia and Pegasus. There’s a link below if you want to have a go.

 

Finding Andromeda.

As for the planets Mercury, Mars, and Neptune are hidden behind the glare of the Sun. But Venus is still there shining brightly in Sagittarius) shines as the "Morning Star" in the southeast just before and during dawn.

Jupiter shines brightly in the west at dusk and sets roughly an hour after dark now. But by 8:45 the giant planet has set.

Saturn rises at 10p.m., in the south east, you may get a glimpse of the rings in binoculars, and they’re at a reasonable angle to us now.

Uranus is a bout 7° west (lower right) of Jupiter and disappearing into the evening twilight. And it’s easier to see with the naked eye now as it moves away from Jupiter’s glare, but it’s very dim.

On that was your nights sky for the week ending on the 72^nd anniversary of the erroneous word "Dord" being discovered in the Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition, prompting an investigation. It seems it was submitted as capital D or d as an abbreviation for density but through a shameful example of howling ineptitude it went in as Dord, which is fascinating.  

150 today.

This weeks Scilly Stars is a very special one, hence the fanfare, it’s the 150^th, which seems rather a lot to me, and it is it’s about 7 and a half hours, and I’ve got all of them. So if anybody wants copies I can just squeeze them onto 6 cds, but do bear in mind I’m not anticipating a huge take up on that offer, even if it were free, which its not. Anyway because it’s so special this Scilly Stars is like the radio equivalent of the end of the Christmas 2 Ronnies, I only wish you could see all the hoopla, suffice to say I'm recording this week’s in a gold lame jacket wearing a very fetching Liberace toupee. I also, in a dream, asked god if he would make a guest appearance, but was told no, because it seems it would have upset Alan Bookbinder, the previous head of religious programming at the BBC, but that was only a dream and maybe Mr Bookbinder wouldn't have minded, but we’ll never know. But in the end I dad manage to get a celebrity, Dieter Markus Stein who holds the record for landing the worlds biggest, but sadly Mr Stein couldn't speak English very well so I dropped him.

 This is a picture of the largest common carp in the world - a colossal record-breaking beast weighing in at 85lb 9oz. It was taken by German ace Dieter Markus Stein from a top-secret stillwater in his homeland, a venue which is regarded as one of the hardest lakes on the Continent where the gap between bites can sometimes run into months

Now sadly for such a special occasion, there is very little going on up there this week, in fact it’s almost the same as last week.

No Mercury and no Mars, in fact no Mars until the summer. But we have the other 3, 4 if you include Uranus, which seems reasonable.

Venus, still a very bright –4.3 blazes as the "Morning Star" in the southeast before and during dawn.

A bright but dimming Jupiter, which is now moving toward the other side of the sun, shines brightly in the southwest as the stars come out; it sinks lower later. We only have Jupiter for another couple of months, by the of March it will be setting with the sun.

Saturn a lot dimmer than Jupiter rises around 11 p.m, and is best ssen due south in the early hours before dawn.

Uranus is naked eye visible, but only just, is about 4° west of Jupiter and pulling away from it.

But anyway its to cold to look anyway, I did try at the weekend and after 45 seconds I surrendered then scurried back in doors with a hacking cough more dead than alive.

And that was you 150^th Scilly Stars for the week ending on the 216^th anniversary of the ratification of The 11th Amendment to the US Constitution.

And if the 11 amendment has slipped your mind here it is.

The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.